Supporting Cast: Precinct 21 (M&M Superlink)

As with any roleplaying game, the players’ characters are the center of attention. It is a trapping of the genres that roleplaying games emulate, stretching back to the most basic myths and legends. Though the heroes remain the focus of the stories told in comic books, the ancillary characters, the supporting cast, are often just as important and iconic as the heroes themselves.

Whether it is a hero’s trusted butler, love interest, or professional rival, these supporting characters serve as an important part of the hero’s mythology. They become part of the fabric of the hero’s life and the dual nature of any costumed crimefighter serves to complicate those relationships. An employer in the hero’s civilian life might also serve as a powerful antagonist to that same hero’s costumed identity.

The Supporting Cast series of short supplements from Big Finger Games provides a plug-and-play solution to a hero’s need for dramatic resonance with the incidental characters he or she deals with on a daily basis. The supporting characters contained within can be plugged into a new hero’s background or be introduced into an existing campaign. They provide a useful story base and infrastructure and can be used to flesh out a setting even if they aren’t directly tied to any of the heroes.

Supporting Cast: Precinct 21 details a police precinct that can be dropped into any gleaming metropolis or urban dystopia in your campaign. Included are:

Backgrounds and stats for four of the major characters involved with the Precinct, including a disgraced cop turned P.I., the commander of GSWAT, a K-9 officer, and a Crime Scene Investigator. Options are included for injecting more four-color concepts into some of the characters’ backgrounds.

Heroic Cop and Heroic Detective templates.

Details on GSWAT (Gadgets, Super Weapons and Advanced Technology).

Eight adventure hooks.

Ideas for incorporating Precinct 21 into your campaign and using it as a springboard for drama and adventure.

As the boilerplate introduction to the Supporting Cast line states, superheroes are surrounded by lots of "ordinary people." The Supporting Cast line aims to present NPCs that GMs can drop into just about any Mutants & Masterminds campaig [...]

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